Music Review: Ryuichi Sakamoto’s Posthumous Album ‘Opus’ Celebrates His Pioneering Musical Legacy

TOKYO – Recorded and filmed as he was dying of cancerRyuichi Sakamoto’s “Opus” — the Japanese film composer’s posthumous album and documentary of the same name — is clearly intended to be his final farewell.

As an album, it’s fitting that Sakamoto’s recording of 20 songs and an hour and a half of sparse piano playing is a retrospective, taking the listener on a journey through his half-century career.

A highlight is the first recorded version of the fun and lyrical “Tong Poo” from their early days with the techno-pop trio Yellow Magic Orchestra, also known as YMO. They were the pioneers of 1970s electronic music and a Japanese band that hit the global stage.

The album “Opus” will be released Friday via Milan Records. Features solo piano versions of the film soundtracks that form the cornerstones of Sakamoto’s legacy, beginning with the majestic theme of Bernardo Bertolucci “The Last Emperor”, a film set in the final days of imperial China before its communist regime.

It won the Oscar for best original score, making Sakamoto the first Asian to win the honor. The 1987 film, starring John Lone, also won best picture. The score also won a Grammy.

Elsewhere, the track “BB” is Sakamoto’s tribute to Bertolucci, a tender love poem to his brilliant collaborator.

“Opus” also features the forlornly pensive music Sakamoto made for Bertolucci’s 1990 “The Sheltering Sky,” which juxtaposed emotionally lost American travelers with the unforgiving vastness of North Africa.

And it includes music from “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence,” a 1983 film about a World War II POW camp directed by Nagisa Oshima, in which Sakamoto also starred. It became his signature piece.

Sakamoto’s sound has an unmistakably Asian feel that is difficult to define, but evident through the use of certain harmonies, pentatonic motifs or scales. His sound also evokes Debussy, but to be fair, this is all Sakamoto.

Minimalist is another way some have described his ability to speak in the silences between notes.

All the songs on “Opus” were immaculately recorded in Tokyo’s NHK 509 studio, played without an audience in 2022. The changing of the piano pedal and, at times, its breathing are present.

A moving black and white documentary by his son Neo Sora documents the recordings, spread over several days due to Sakamoto’s weakening health.

This testimony to Sakamoto’s music underlines an artist’s commitment to his work that was present until the end. The album’s slogan reads: “Art is long, life is short.”

“Opus” is about death, with segments, like the title track that closes the album, resonating like a solemn prayer.

Sakamoto wanted to record his performance while he still could. He felt very exhausted after recording and his condition worsened. He died on March 28, 2023, in Tokyo. He was 71 years old.

“In a sense, although I thought of this as my last opportunity to act, I also felt that I was capable of breaking new ground,” he said in a statement accompanying the project.

Here is a man who is not afraid to face his catalog of works and give it his personal interpretation, knowing it would be his last.

In doing so, with calm dignity, he reminds us not to fear death.

___

Yuri Kageyama is on X: https://twitter.com/yurikageyama

___

For more AP analysis of recent music releases, visit: